S&P 500 Slips on Tech Wobble Ahead of Fed Meeting

By Yasin Ebrahim

Investing.com -- The S&P 500 fell Monday, pressured by weakness in tech with just days to go until the Federal Reserve is expected to deliver another jumbo-sized rate hike.

The S&P 500 fell 0.4%, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.1% or 30 points, the Nasdaq was down 0.60%. The major indices, however, are set to post a monthly gain for October.

A 6% slump in Meta Platforms Inc (NASDAQ:META) led the fall in tech after mostly disappointing quarterly results from big tech.

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL), Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL), and Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) were down more than 1%.

Falling semiconductor stocks also exacerbated the wobble in tech following pressure from Advanced Micro Devices (NASDAQ:AMD), NVIDIA (NASDAQ:NVDA) and ON Semiconductor Corporation.

ON Semiconductor Corporation (NASDAQ:ON) fell more than 8% despite quarterly results that beat on both the top and bottom lines and guidance that was in line with Wall Street estimates.  

Treasury yields, meanwhile, steadied after falling last week as investors looked to the start of the Fed’s two-day meeting on Tuesday that is expected to culminate in a decision to lift rates by 0.75% for the fourth consecutive meeting.

But the focus “will be on what comes next, and we expect Chair Powell to hint that the FOMC will likely slow the pace to 50bp in December,” Goldman Sachs said in a note.

Paramount Global (NASDAQ:PARA), meanwhile, fell about 4% after Wells Fargo downgraded the company to underweight from equal weight, citing worries about the company’s linear business and uncertainty in streaming.

Energy stocks sidestepped the broader market malaise after shrugging off a decline in oil prices as OPEC lifted its forecast on oil demand in the medium and longer term.

EQT (NYSE:EQT), Coterra Energy (NYSE:CTRA), and Schlumberger NV (NYSE:SLB) were up sharply, with the latter adding to gains from last week ahead of its Investor Day this week.

“While many agree with our view that the digital business and international business at SLB is best in class, there are questions whether investors can express the same view through peers that trade at lower multiples,” Goldman Sachs added.

In other news, Tusimple (NASDAQ:TSP) tumbled 46% after firing its CEO, Xiaodi Hou amid a Wall Street Journal report the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Securities and Exchange Commission are investigating whether the self-driving company improperly financed and transferred technology to Hydron.